“Man, those kids ever gonna catch up or what?” Dalan yawned a little as he viewed the security footage.

  Dalan was currently sitting in a security room that wasn’t far from the helipad that his airship would be arriving in. He lazily observed each security screen one by one until finally, something happened. One of the screens went black. Followed by another one in the similar area. And another.

  “They’re here. Oh yeah! One last hunting trip before I go!”

  Dalan got up, grabbed his daggers, and rushed out of the room. His mind and body were singlehandedly focused on one thing. Hunting down those damn brats.

  ‘Those cams went out in the basement. So they’re trying to enter from underground to get the jump on me. Hah!’

  Dalan descended down the mall a floor at a time. The mall had 3 floors, including the ground floor, but it also had a basement that acted as a parking lot. Clearly, the brats were trying to use that as cover, but he had been using the mall as a base for a while so he knew its layout.

  It wasn’t long before he reached the parking lot. A lot of ruined cars that had been collecting dust were still parked in this lot, kept safe only because it was underground. These cars were all non-functional as a result.

  ‘I don’t see them anywhere.’ Dalan narrowed his eyes.

  Dalan slowly walked around the car park. The kids had to be in here, he had just entered through the only way up. So long as he was guarding it, they had to go through him.

  Dalan kept the way up, a pair of escalators, in his sight. The brats were hiding from him, and he knew it. It was just a simple game of hide and seek until he found them.

  *Clang!*

  A car’s sideview mirror broke off and the glass shattered on the ground. Dalan reacted with speed and leapt across cars to the location. His daggers shone and his mana rotated around them.

  The person who broke it was Carmine, and she was ready. An axe flew at Dalan, but it was easily deflected. No blood line was connected though, so he looked back.

  “Hello, you murderhobo!” Machua yelled as she caught the axe and threw it right back.

  Dalan sidestepped it, allowing Carmine to pick it back up as she jumped for an attack. He quickly jumped out of the way, dodging her wild swings until the cars next to them were eviscerated.

  ‘Amateur!’ Dalan’s smirk intensified as he plunged his daggers into the gap between her attacks.

  The daggers met flesh, but Carmine’s gleeful expression didn’t fade. Dalan, recognising what that meant swiftly dodged away. A scythe had just pierced his previous position.

  Following that, both Rasa and Machua thrust their weapons at him, but he easily dodged away, and landed on the top of a truck.

  Looking around him, he found that he was surrounded by all the members of the squad. He scanned each of them briefly, but his gaze lingered on Plue.

  ‘That’s the girl the goat wanted me to keep alive,’ he noticed. ‘Ah, whatever, she can die too.’

  “Is Ernie here?” He asked them.

  “Hah, wouldn’t you like to know?” Machua responded.

  Nobody had managed to make their way up. He was still keeping an eye on that place, so he knew Ernest hadn’t made his way up. If he even was here. Even then, though, he couldn’t be his priority. There was someone that was definitely here that he was just waiting for.

  “Indigo-!” Mikoko leapt up at him with her staff ready, filled with purple lightning.

  “Aren’t you a one trick pony!?” Dalan yelled out as he jumped to meet her in the air.

  “-Bolt!”

  Mikoko swung her staff early and a bolt of purple lightning shot from its tip. The bolt shot at Dalan, who began to rapidly slash before him. It dispersed from all of his slashes, but the attacks weren’t done yet. Each other member of squad jumped up and launched a strike at him.

  Plue reached him first, but the scythe was kicked away. Rasa reached him next, but with the electrifying mana still floating around his daggers, Dalan merely clashed with the bow-sword. The jolt of lightning went up Rasa’s blade and shocked him, which allowed Dalan to kick him away.

  Rasa was sent flying into another car. But the next attacker didn’t let up. It was Carmine, but her attacks didn’t quite land either. It was easy for Dalan to get the upper hand and throw her off of the truck. Now that all of them were dealt with, he turned his focus on-

  ‘Wait! Where’s the tonfas!?’ Dalan looked rapidly for the tonfa wielder.

  “Agh.” He held his neck. The Devouring Ampoule he used wasn’t perfect, so turning his neck like that was a bit much for him.

  It was at this moment that he noticed the shadow he was casting was larger than usual. He turned his gaze up and above him was a huge water tower.

  “Mana Burst!” Machua thrusted both tonfas into the water tower. The water tower exploded from the impact causing the water inside to gush out.

  Dalan’s eyes did not linger on it though, he kept them on Mikoko. Mikoko was spinning her staff, charging it with mana. The staff was surrounded by several clouds, and with each rotation they were increasing in number.

  Dalan only slashed as much as he needed to stop the water tower from hitting him. He didn’t pay attention to the water however. The water didn’t matter at all if he wasn’t hit by the lightning. So, all he had to do was focus on the incoming storm.

  Mikoko stopped spinning her staff and held it by her side. In one swift motion, she swung, and all the clouds attached to it flew forth.

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  [Grinder Drive]

  Dalan’s mana enveloped his daggers with rotating shredding blades that spun faster than ever before. They produced a sound like a chainsaw about to burst and were visible, coloured whitish-yellow.

  Dalan simply slashed once horizontally. The clouds that were rushing to him were sliced in two, no, not even just that. The clouds parted, as if they didn’t dare touch him.

  With his vision clear, Dalan could spot the path to take to cut that purple oni. He was about to jump when suddenly, he noticed Mikoko had the slightest of smiles.

  ‘What the hell is that for-‘

  Before he could consider it, the truck beneath his feet disappeared. Mikoko raised her staff up high and slammed it down into the ground. The cloud that floated above him fell to ground level and obscured everything he could see.

  Dalan shot his feet down to find his footing, but in that foggy cloud, unable to see anything, he was not capable of sensing the movements of the person behind him.

  [Mana Burst Kick!]

  Machua’s kick landed squarely onto Dalan’s head. The force of the kick sent him flying out of the cloud and crumpling onto the floor.

  But it wasn’t over yet. A car appeared in the air and fell towards him. Dalan instinctively slashed it apart and within the gap, he spotted the brat who did this.

  Machua was standing in the air with a grin on her face. “Hah! That one’s for Machi!”

  Seeing the spitting image of the guy that got him so angry he looped back around to not caring got his blood boiling. His anger surged and his smirk began to crack.

  “Ha… Haha. Oh, you just made yourself target number 1. I really didn’t think it was possible for someone to piss me off more than Erebus, but somehow ya managed it. Congrats. I’ll give you the most painful death ever.”

  Machua dashed off and Dalan pursued her. He was aware that he was leaving the way up free. The moment he was engulfed in that cloud, the way up was compromised. There was no use in keeping track of it any longer.

  None of Machua’s squadmates seemed to be around, but he couldn’t be sure if they made their way up. They could be hiding behind the cars, just waiting to jump him. A fake out. But to be honest, he didn’t really care. He was going to rip that Dimension bitch limb from limb.

  Dalan caught up to Machua but in his path was yet another car sent his way. He sent a flying slash, which cut through it effortlessly. The flying slash forced Machua to head to the ground amidst the maze of cars, but Dalan never lost sight of her. His rapid flying slashes tore the cars around them apart.

  As Machua ran, she was constantly storing cars and taking them out mid-air to send them at Dalan. She took them out as obstacles, shields, anything to impede him.

  “Man, you’re turning the place into a junkyard!” Machua exclaimed.

  Dalan had torn apart just about every single car in the area. Machua ran over to the nearest intact car and held out her hand to store it. Her mana wrapped around it but… it didn’t work. She tried it again on the car next to it but it didn’t work on either of them.

  “Hahaha! Those are my cars, idiot! Their fuel’s gas that’s loaded with mana! You can’t store any of them!”

  Machua hurriedly flipped the fuel filler door on the nearest car, but before she could siphon much fuel, Dalan reached her. His dagger almost pierced her if it weren’t that she slid under the car.

  Machua tumbled over and stood up, meeting Dalan’s gaze who was still on the other side of the car. The two dared each other to move. Machua would gladly do so, but she couldn’t predict whether Dalan actually cared for the car or not. In the end, she chose…

  ‘Another fucking car!’

  Dalan slashed through the debris of a car that was sent flying at him. Taking this chance, Machua rushed to another one of Dalan’s cars and flipped open the fuel filler door. She extracted as much of the gas as she could before Dalan reached her next.

  Dalan stabbed forward with his dagger, which made Machua jump back. But she landed mid-air onto an invisible wall and jumped straight back at him. Her leg was outstretched with the shoe positioned to meet his face. Dalan instantly recognised that shoe.

  Faced with that, he decided, he was simply not going to cut it. He leaned forward to cut the leg above the shoe, but before he could, the shoe impacted another invisible wall. Machua sprung back with a massive leap and tumbled onto the ground.

  ‘Huh?’ Dalan was perplexed at it. It wasn’t her trying to avoid his cuts. She could stand and roll anywhere she wanted in the air. So why did she…

  ‘She doused the ground in gas? But she didn’t even siphon much fuel from the cars! Where’d the hell did she!?’ But before Dalan’s thought could finish, a flame was ignited.

  [Precision Ignition]

  The small flame that Machua set ignited the gasoline that was doused all over the ground. The gasoline, connected to Dalan’s cars, caused them to explode magnificently.

  Machua wrapped her body with mana to defend against the explosion’s impact. When the initial explosion was over, Dalan could still be seen standing in the middle of the flames. His face was contorted into a furious expression. The mana around his body kept the flames from engulfing him and that same mana was what protected him from the explosion. It was impossible for Machua to tell how much mana it took, but it had to be substantial. Probably.

  “By the way, I wasn’t trying to siphon fuel. I was adding more in. The fuel you saw me siphon was me taking out the fuel stored in my dimension. And that’s also the fuel I doused the ground with. It’s just regular non-magic fuel, but anything that helps, right?” Machua explained aloud.

  “Sorry I couldn’t get you a chair. Cause you’re about to be stuck there for a while,” Machua spoke.

  Suddenly, Dalan recognised there was a presence behind him. And that the presence was swinging both her axes directly at his neck. Dalan’s daggers flew up to defend him, but instead of deflecting the axes like before, he found more strength was being put into the strike.

  “Now that they’re all gone, I can go all out!”

  Carmine pushed Dalan’s daggers aside and forced him to dodge backwards. His first motion was to get out of the flames, but it was too late. All around him were thunderclouds.

  [Cumulonimbus Dome]

  ‘Was that all a distraction just for this!?’

  The thunderclouds had completely surrounded the flaming area in a dome. Now what to do? If Dalan tried to escape, he would be shocked by the thunderclouds, but if he stayed then he would have to keep staving off the flames and the bloodthirsty vampire. The answer was obvious.

  ‘I’ll just force my way out!’

  Dalan pumped more mana into his daggers, but it was at that moment, a sound like a garbled chainsaw reached his ears. The sound was coming from outside the thunderstorm barrier, and mysteriously, it seemed to slow down and even neutralise some of his rotating blades.

  ‘They figured it out!? When the hell did they- The string guy!’ Dalan quickly realised it. Rasa had neutralised his screeching spell earlier, so it was clear to him that Rasa must have been behind this as well.

  The brat must have been playing that screech right outside the barrier, but because of the storm, the sound was a little muffled. Nevertheless, it did its job of suppressing his blades. He wanted to go over and smash that gauntlet and sword to bits, but the current situation was quite a conundrum.

  The thunderclouds wouldn’t engulf the area, he was sure of it. Mikoko would not want to injure her ally. Carmine was necessary to keep him distracted so they could set this up, but that meant she was trapped in here too. Not that she seemed to care, she kept regenerating from her wounds.

  If Dalan still wanted to break out with brute force, it would cost quite a bit of mana under the suppressive force of that continuous neutralising screech. And he would have to do so while under attack from Carmine. However, the same went for her. If Mikoko opened up a path for her to escape, then he could easily follow through. The two were trapped in here together and Carmine already made her choice.

  ‘I’ll go for the vampire first! She can’t last forever and once she’s injured, she’ll have to retreat and I’ll chase her.’

  Paying no mind to the flames beneath his feet, Dalan leapt at Carmine with a ferocious growl.

  ———————————————————————

  Outside of the storm barrier, Machua was collapsed on the ground. She was breathing heavily with her eyes closed. Compared to the front she put up before, Machua looked as if she could faint at any second.

  “I honestly have no idea why you had to be the first target. Fighting someone with a purity that makes you sick, and isn’t holding back, for an extended period of time is almost suicidal.” Mikoko let out a deep sigh as she brushed Machua’s sweat off her brow.

  Machua was suffering from the effects of a purity disparity between her and Dalan. Dalan, as someone who could encounter Erebus Squad and survive, had a high purity that Mikoko guessed was maybe 66%. Machua’s mana purity was only 48% which meant a difference of 18%. That was dangerously close to the 20% death threshold, so naturally, she was suffering for it. She managed to stave it off before by shielding herself with her mana wherever she could but having spent so much time leading him around, it was bound to catch up to her.

  “Hah…” Machua spoke with a tired grin, “I promised Machi I’d stomp him. And I got his ass.”

  Mikoko watched as Machua’s breathing began to stabilise. Every time she exhaled, quite a good amount of mana flew out alongside her breath. This was the mana that was too pure for her, Dalan’s mana.

  Mikoko dabbed up more sweat on Machua’s brow and took a closer look at it. Within the sweat was the same mana that Machua had just breathed out.

  ‘Is her body naturally expelling the pure mana out?’

  Mikoko watched Machua’s chest rise and fall, almost a little transfixed. With every motion, more of the pure mana was expelled. It took only a few breaths before Machua was able to stand up.

  ‘So fast. Normally, if a person was suffering from a disparity that large, they’d have to spend the entire day in bed.’

  “Were you filtering out Dalan’s mana before?” Mikoko asked.

  “I tried to shield myself from it, yeah.”

  “That’s not quite the same. If you try to form a wall or a barrier to protect against purer mana, then that mana will begin to erode yours. Purer mana has to be handled carefully, so the protection you have to form would be filtering them,” Mikoko explained.

  Machua blinked a few times.

  “I know how to filter purer mana, but you have the World Trait otherwise I would have taught you. You recovered very quick for that big of a disparity. You must have done something.”

  “Maybe I’m special?” Machua suggested.

  “Maybe you are,” Mikoko responded without much thought.

  Suddenly, a loud crashing noise came from within the storm barrier. Both girls took a look.

  “I took too long resting! Take these, I’m gonna go set everything up!” Machua spoke fast and handed Mikoko the two phones she had with her.

  Mikoko watched as Machua dashed off. Her eyes lingered on her back just briefly before she turned to the phones. The burner phones were blaring that screech continuously at as high of a volume they could muster. As a result though, their battery was nearly dead.

  ‘They’re not like normal phones. These are more like specialised magic tools. Their mana consumption is much greater so they can broadcast at such a high volume,’ Mikoko noted down.

  She shoved the phones into her pocket and readied her staff. She had no idea just how long Carmine could handle. At any time now she might signal for her to open the storm barrier for her to escape. When that would happen, the two of them would escape upwards together. She only hoped Carmine knew when to pull out.

  ‘To be honest… I have no idea how strong Carmine is. She just might be able to end this herself.’